Reading

Effective classroom management can be bolstered by an informed understanding of student behaviour, and a reliable toolkit of tips and strategies. In this article, we outline five further readings that examine effective approaches to classroom management.

Readers often get in touch with Teacher to share how their school is making a difference to student outcomes. New South Wales educator Mary Semaan contacted us recently to talk about how the teaching and leadership team at Al Sadiq College has been working to improve primary students’ writing skills.

With Term 1 just around the corner in Australia, it’s a great time to start brainstorming events and themes to tie in to your lesson planning for the new school year. We’ve rounded up some of the key dates in each term to help get you started.

Effective teacher-parent relationships and parent engagement in their child’s learning improves student outcomes. Researchers in the United States have surveyed parents and carers of preschoolers about their role in their child’s learning, and the support they’d like from teachers.

‘The change over the last 20 years in what and how students read has emphasised the importance not only of assessing students’ capacity to read, but also what they have learned about the credibility of what they read.’ In her latest Teacher column, Dr Sue Thomson delves into international PISA 2018 data on reading literacy and digital literacy skills.

In this episode of School Improvement, we’re taking you to a school in rural New South Wales where students in Years 5 to 9 are reading 12 books each year. Head of Middle School and English teacher Alex Wharton joins us to share how this has been achieved.

A new Australian study exploring reading enjoyment, reading frequency and student achievement has challenged the gender stereotype that boys prefer non-fiction, underscoring the importance of all students being given access to a wide range of genres and text types from an early age.

A new study has explored job titles and descriptions for school librarian jobs advertised in the United States and Australia to assess the emphasis placed on a school librarian’s role in promoting reading for pleasure. Researchers found ‘Australian school librarians are far more likely to be expected to foster reading for pleasure’.

Reading for pleasure has been shown to have a powerful influence on children’s learning. In our latest reader submission about learning during lockdown, Junior School Curriculum Director Vanessa Collins shares details of the ‘Just Read’ action research project to build a culture of reading at Sydney’s Queenwood School for Girls, and ignite in students a love of reading for pleasure.

We often hear about why it’s important that children read for pleasure, but we don’t seem to place that same importance on adults’ reading habits. So, is it important that adults read for enjoyment? And if so, how many adults actually read for pleasure on a regular basis? We talk to Dr Judith Seaboyer from the University of Queensland to find out more.